People sure are excited about (pirating) ‘The Mandalorian’

Disney+’s The Mandalorian is hot. Like, stolen car hot.

The much anticipated Star Wars television show premiered on Nov. 12, and within hours it was already being illegally downloaded by thousands of people. Which, frankly, isn’t that surprising — especially considering Disney bungled the launch of its streaming platform. 

A quick jaunt over to The Pirate Bay allows for a peek into the world of pirated content. As of the time of this writing, there are six different versions of the show’s first episode available for download. And while we did not download the episodes to verify they’re real (or that they’re virus free), the thousands of people seeding the episode seem to suggest there’s at least something there. 

Of course, that people would pirate The Mandalorian shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone — especially Disney. Back when Game of Thrones was still considered good, the Season 8 premiere episode was reportedly watched illegally more than 54 million times in the first 24 hours after airing. 

And yeah, some of those illegally downloaded files likely contained malware. Which, other than the ethical and moral reasons, probably provides the most solid justification for just shelling out for the damn thing the legal way. 

After all, the $6.99-a-month subscription fee is a lot less than the cost of replacing a virus-laden computer.